Blair’s vision, awareness make up for lack of scoring

Spurs center DeJuan Blair positioned himself just north of the foul line Monday, watching his favorite play unfold just as it was drawn up. Tim Duncan had sealed his Phoenix defender on the low block and was about to spring free for a layup.

All Blair needed was the ball.

First, Blair flashed his hands at Richard Jefferson, the universal sign for “pass it to me.” When that didn’t work, Blair let out a “whoop” to get Jefferson’s attention.

Jefferson shipped the ball to Blair, who immediately fired to Duncan for the easy basket Blair had seen coming for several seconds.

“I just love that play,” Blair said. “Tim does an excellent job of sealing any dude off that is fronting him, and that makes him wide open. It’s automatic.”

Thanks to his high-low connection with Duncan, Blair had a season-high four assists in the Spurs’ 118-110 win over the Suns, offsetting his season-high four turnovers.

Blair’s shooting percentage is down 9.1 points from a year ago, when he led all NBA rookies at 55.6 percent.

Spurs coach Gregg Popovich has been pleased Blair has found other ways to contribute, even as he has struggled with scoring.

“While he’s learning how to shoot the ball and score the ball, it’s great he can catch and pass the way he does,” Popovich said, “because he can do some other things besides shoot to help us score.”

Blair’s high-low telepathy with Duncan could become a big part of those “other things.”

“That’s still a work in progress,” Popovich said. “I think DeJuan’s getting better and better at reading Timmy and what people are trying to do to him.”

NO CHARGE: Manu Ginobili won’t mind if he has to provide another winning basket tonight against Denver. He might, however, draw the line at absorbing another charge from Carmelo Anthony.

In a 113-112 victory in Denver six days ago, Ginobili supplied the Spurs’ winning points on a bank shot with 4.2 seconds to go, then sealed the game by letting Anthony barrel over him with 0.4 ticks left.

SYMPATHY FOR DUNKEE: Gary Neal was not so lucky on his attempt at charge-taking in Denver. J.R. Smith’s soaring dunk over him became a staple of the national highlight shows.

Though his teammates gave Neal grief about the slam, many also could sympathize with him.

“Whoever plays in the NBA, sooner or later, is going to get one of those,” Ginobili said. “We’ve all been there. No exceptions.”

Lost in the post-dunk hysteria was the fact that Smith was not Neal’s man.

Smith had beaten Ime Udoka badly to get to the rim. By sliding over to help, Neal was doing exactly what he was supposed to.

“He did a good job,” Ginobili said. “He tried to get there. He was just a little late.”